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Planning a Story Line with the Invisibles
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6 thoughts on “Planning a Story Line with the Invisibles”
For the very first time today, I led my French I class in creating a completely non-targeted story using an OWI. (I’ve done stories in the past using their characters and some of their ideas, but I always had structures in mind to target when it came to telling the story.) My question is: do I circle all of the new information like in a regular TPRS story? I wasn’t doing a whole lot of circling at all today. I felt like it stymied their creativity. I went slowly, developing characters, and making the problem as detailed as possible, describing things in many different ways, etc., but I wasn’t really doing traditional circling. They really wanted to forge on ahead with the story, since they had ownership of it. I fully intend on doing all of the circling after I have written the story down…but what do you do in the moment of story creation?
Hillary congrats on your first non-targeted story. That is good news indeed.
You said:
…I wasn’t doing a whole lot of circling at all today. I felt like it stymied their creativity….
Yes. That is exactly what Tina and I experienced and why we set out to change the options for CI teachers.
You said:
… I went slowly, developing characters, and making the problem as detailed as possible….
This in my view and Tina’s is all that is necessary.
Also:
… they really wanted to forge on ahead with the story, since they had ownership of it….
Once they have ownership, all the other stuff that gets stuck between our teeth in teaching becomes far less of a problem – stuff like assessment and classroom management. You will see how that works. It’s all easier once they have ownership of the class. I am interested in a report on the jobs as they develop. Remember, we don’t assign the 14 jobs, we let them emerge organically with time and if no student shows up to claim a job, then don’t use it. (We only start with the artist(s) and the Profe 2 – they are necessary, the rest aren’t.)
Also Hillary this is such a big question:
…I fully intend on doing all of the circling after I have written the story down….but what do you do in the moment of story creation?
In the moment of story creation, instead of circling (destroys the story line in favor of the targets) what I do is just ask the next interesting question. That is how I do it.
Are you going to use the 21 Reading Options tomorrow, at least #’s 4-7 as discussed in a recent post here? Because THAT is when you will get mega reps on the story, a kind of reading circling if you will, but without focusing on certain targets. It’s so freeing.
I want to hear about the jobs and how the reading goes. Then, in the Invisibles Star Sequence, you can look forward to a nice easy dictee and then the fun Word Chunk Team Game to end the sequence.
The thing is that I no longer do “circling” as I envision it, trying to get reps upon reps. Instead, I know that if I follow the sequence on the star I will pile up a lot of exposures to the language that was needed to build the story. There is no need to wear ourselves or our students out trying to get reps, reps reps. That star is amazing. It is like a multimedia smorgasbord of fun, painless, easygoing repeated exposures to the language.
Just recently in French class we did this video retell:
https://youtu.be/6SA3TZRNJsE
It totally spontaneously happened, based on a OWI, their first one, actually, a giant bowl of rice. Those actors are, by the way, brand-new. NATURALS!
I love that bowl of rice!
Think of all the repetitions:
First, in the OWI process. Then, in the review of the artists’ work. Then, I wrote a text on the bowl of rice and we read it together. Then we did reading options. Then we made this little vignette that emerged as we were doing Readers Theatre with the text I wrote about the bowl of rice. It had all the skeletal details of this video retell.
The kids, after this, helped me write up a comic book (I am LOVING doing Write and Discuss directly into Mike Peto’s comics template.
https://mrpeto.wordpress.com/2017/06/18/how-to-add-15-new-beginner-level-texts-to-your-classroom-library-every-week/
They will illustrate this story today (PERFECT sub plan by the way!) so they will get more exposures.
Then these little comic books will appear in late October as part of the roll-out of the classroom library and reading time. They will be half-forgotten by that point and I predict squeals of delight at being reunited with them.
Ben, Tina – thank you so much for your thoughtful responses. I so appreciate the time that you all are taking in guiding CI newcomers like myself. I will be doing a variety of reading activities (the 21 you posted are very helpful!) but I have to wait until Monday due to the rotating schedule and a freshman trip. At least that gives me time to plan and reflect!
Just so you know I rarely do any but the Big Four – Choral Reading/Grammar Instruction (combined in real time) and Reading from the Back of the Room/Reader’s Theatre(combined as well). Those are reading options #4-7.
You don’t seem like a beginner! You got this!